Jupiter snapped by the Juno polar orbiter
Posted on 02/20/2021 6:24:26 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you.
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So does a new onion come out of the center?? I just might try this until I can get at my egyptian green onions when the snow melts.
Really nice looking lettuce!
I cut up extra green onions in the summer, chop them and put in foodsaver bags and vacuum seal. Great to throw in a pot of soup at the end of cooking.
Yes, I had a number of little mushrooms growing at the start. The puffball on the plant was what made me concerned however. It was spreading from the hay onto the thyme. I didn't want to use the thyme because I had no idea of the toxicity of the puffball. And, if I do it again this year do I need to do some sort of "fungicide" around the dead bales to prevent it from happening again?
I thought the point of hay bale gardening was to have a "warm and wet" growing zone. (sigh) I'm so bad at this!
Made it through our 2nd ice storm in a week. We lost power last weekend & were on a generator for almost 24 hours. This latest storm, wee hours of Thursday morning into Friday morning, was supposed to be worse with 1/2 to 1” of ice in the forecast for our area. That would have caused severe damage to power lines, trees, etc. Happily for all, the forecast was a BUST!!!! I’ve never seen so many happy people over a busted forecast. The interesting thing is that all the models busted in the last 12 hours - usually, that is when they are most accurate.
So today, most of the ice is out of the trees. We still have some areas where sleet accumulated (we got more sleet, less freezing rain - roads were worse, but power stayed on!). Most of the stuff left on the ground will be gone by tonight. Everything is sloppy - we’ve got standing water puddles in places where I’ve never seen puddles before - slow melt doesn’t result in runoff like rain. I did some dog-sitting yesterday evening & there were some major muddy paws to contend with after our evening walk around the fields.
Stuck inside pretty much, but the sun is out - yay! Also, today is the final day of the Iron Dog Race. Since last Saturday, I’ve been on GPS & watching live-streaming or video from the villagers at checkpoints - it’s been a different race with COVID precautions, but some of those changes also made for additional excitement in various ways. I’m already looking forward to next year’s race .... I really love Iron Dog. It definitely helps make February & the winter doldrums more tolerable.
[Cue Elvis voice ...] Why thank you. Thank you very much ;-)
That’s a lot better.
These are little onion bulbs with greens. Cut the green tops and more green will grow. And 100 plants take up practically no space. Plant them anyplace. I don’t grow them for the onions...just the greens.
I did straw bale gardening a couple of years ago - worked well for me and I did have mushrooms or mushroom like stuff growing out of my bales.
The book I used as a resource was “Straw Bale Gardens Complete” by Joel Karsten. It has a lot of pictures, great ideas for making a trellis over the bales - even using them as a ‘greenhouse’ for cold(er) weather planting. There are also garden plans for various numbers of bales. The pictures and garden plans are terrific. I highly recommend the book. PS - he’s even got a way to make your own planting ‘bales” using kitchen scraps, grass clippings, last year’s leftover bales - anything compostable
About mushrooms, he says:
“Mushrooms may sprout on the outside of the bales, and this is a good sign. Mushrooms are a sign that the inside of the bales have begun to decompose. The mushrooms that bloom will not hurt anything, so there is no need to do anything to them. Knock them over if you’d like, but they will probably grow right back. If you ignore them, they will disappear completely within a few weeks.”
Here’s an Amazon link for the book:
https://www.amazon.com/Straw-Bale-Gardens-Complete-Karsten/dp/1591869072
Just a quick update from the Humboldt Bay region of Calif.
Lady Bender and I have reached the stage in our lives that we had to hire a gardening service to clean up our yard and garden and not sure we will plant anything this spring...
Greening of the Earth Mitigates Surface Warming | NASA www.nasa.gov › feature › greening-of-the-earth-mitigat... Nov 23, 2020 — A new study reports that increased vegetation growth during the recent decades, known as the “Greening Earth”, has a strong cooling effect on the land due to increased efficiency of heat and water vapor transfer to the atmosphere. p>A new study published in the journal Science Advances titled “Biophysical impacts of Earth greening largely controlled by aerodynamic resistance” reports that the entire land surface would have been much warmer without the cooling effect of increased green cover during the recent decades. The study used high-quality satellite data from NASA’s MODIS sensors and NCAR’s state-of-the-art numerical earth system model.
“In the fight against climate change, plants are the lonely-only defenders. Stopping deforestation and ecologically sensible large-scale tree-planting could be one simple, but not sufficient, defense against climate change.” said the lead author Dr. Chi Chen a former Ph.D. student at Boston University, now a postdoc researcher at DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Lab.
(Wisconsin as epicenter in image) Video
Our first step is to gather our dirt mix into turkey bags and bake at 350 for a half hour or more. This kills critters that can kill your blossoms.
This saves a lot of anguish when the shoots appear.
Then;
Dont overlook chick grit around the top of the dirt box where the seed starts.
This stuff also saves your mystery deaths...
“I thought the point of hay bale gardening was to have a “warm and wet” growing zone.”
Well, it is, but it also sets you up for fungal issues.
I would say that the thyme had some other fungal issue - like powdery mildew. I’ve not known mushroom-like spores to grow on anything other than hay, wood mulch or something rotting in the woods like a fallen tree.
I wouldn’t use a fungicide; just watch for the mushrooms and pluck them off when you see them. They won’t hurt you, but I probably wouldn’t eat them. ;)
And I’m assuming you’re using STRAW bales. HAY is what animals eat, STRAW is for bedding and using in Straw Bale Gardening.
If you truly ARE using HAY, then that could be the problem, as it breaks down differently than STRAW and holds more moisture.
Hay and straw can be confusing - unless you’re a farmer. ;)
You should be using STRAW bales, not HAY bales, so change that this season if that’s the case.
I use TONS of straw on my garden as mulch. I’ve even used baled soybean stems with no problems. Hay goes to the mule and the steer for lunch. :)
Happens every year in Jacksonville.
So sorry to hear that! But, I’m glad you’re hiring out some help! Keep providing wisdom and guidance to this group for as long as you can!
And tell Lady Bender to keep baking pies if she can! :)
I found one of the fist sized ornamental gourds while beachcombing the lake bed last month. I can’t wait to plant it’s seeds in the “tree” container. It is light orange/ dark orange striped. It was as if it just came off the plant, still heavy and colorful. What a sweet find for January and a total surprise.
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